Take a Breath
by Feather Ice
Summary: The real world is dull and depressingly uninteresting so Kairi generally sticks to the figments of his bizarre imagination. But when one of those figments invades none other than the real world, what is he to do? Espcially when the invader has food!


A/N: Another Nightmare Inspector fic. This one makes a little more sense than All Will Be Well if you don't read the books, so if you're so inclined, read away.

Take a Breath

Kairi hated it when the lips faded off of the walls and they quit telling him poems about sunflowers and their imaginary friends. And when the flying quill pens ceased their wars against Ama-Terasu. And even when Inu-sama quit making clay grasshoppers to pull his toenails out. It was uncomfortable—once they were gone—he was left holding his breath against the quiet and existing out of place in his empty home. Kairi didn't care much to remember the moments of quiet, but while actually in the moment, unable to close his mind off to the hungry, demanding emptiness, he fidgeted and frowned and wondered if he should maybe go out and look for the wayward customer, but he really wasn't taking many of those at the moment, even if it was quiet.

He was doing it now, fingers tense against the sides of his chair, eyes glaring against the dark (gas bills were too mundane to attract any interest), and finding nothing because the world was taking a breath.

Then suddenly Kairi was no longer alone.

"Hello," said a blonde boy from across the room. Kairi stared and the boy took it as his cue to push away from the wall, faltering, and for a split second before his mouth opened again, Kairi thought he had a customer who'd somehow gotten through the locked door. The impression was gone seconds later as the boy gave him a serious look and said one of the most spectacular opening lines that Kairi had ever heard.

"My name is Shima, and I like dressing in women's clothes."

Kairi blinked.

He then blinked again, noting that the clothes were hardly even androgynous. The boy stared back at him from the center of the floor, hands dangling at his sides as though he wasn't quite sure what to do with them. Kairi's mouth opened and his voice graced the room moments later. "No." He said gently. The boy looked startled.

"N… No?"

Kairi gestured vaguely, correcting, "Your name is Shima and you've just married your pet cat."

Now the boy was the one blinking, copying the face Kairi must have made before, still faltering around the edges. He glanced around helplessly.

"My name is Shima and I…" A pause, as the boy apparently considered Kairi's words. His head tilted and blonde haired shimmered in the dark. It could be white, actually. No light at all wasn't conducive to profiling. "…I eat fried tofu sculptures every day."

Kairi's eyes narrowed.

"Your name is Shima and you live for fly fishing."

"My name is Shima and I am a samurai ninja assassin songbird come to take your life."

_Ooh_, thought Kairi. He sat up a little more.

"Your name is Shima and the destiny of the world is in your hands!"

"My name is Shima and I was recently devoured by marauding black bears!"

"Your name is Shima and you must blink three times before picking up any piece of paper!"

"MY name is Shima and _I_ am your FATHER!"

"Your name is Shima and you turn into a flying school bus on a regular basis!"

"My name is Shima," the boy declared, eyes blazing, tension crackling through the air in a way that made Kairi scoot forward in his chair, heart pounding. He cracked the huge grin that usually sent small children running for the hills crying about scary shark men, almost the very same second as the boy's face broke out into one and he took two tottering (not used to walking, Kairi's mind informed him, and proceeded to explain to itself how Shima had been forced to sell his real legs to pay for his grandmother's operation) steps forward, throwing his skinny arms around Kairi. He bashed the other man's chin in the process, which hurt quite a bit. "And I _like_ you!"

Kairi, never one to pass up a free hug, returned the gesture, head flopping comfortably into the crook of the boy's shoulder. He thought he might quite like Shima too.

And then the world exhaled around him, and he was catapulted into the void of the night sky and sucked into a black hole. Kairi welcomed it, not entirely sure why he was already grinning, but not about to complain about it. It was a _black hole_. His head was getting turned _inside out_. Who complained about that?

Anyway, sanity was for those without imagination.

When Kairi returned from his trip through the Kryon System with the trio of flying gophers, Rick, Bob, and Mickey Finn, he started to remember how sad he was supposed to feel about the quiet and the dark and the emptiness of Delusion. But instead he found it bright—an electrical bill paid?—tidy—a broom hefted?—and ringing with the sound of bloodcurdling screams as a wild pterodactyl of some sort—probably a dream room escapee—chased Shima around in circles in front of him.

Kairi actually stopped breathing from the shock of it all. A little prickle of fear was creeping into his heart, wondering if somehow fantasy had come to an end and his dreams were going to start repeating themselves, because Shima was still there. Shima shouldn't have been there. He wasn't real. And the shop should have been as quiet as he'd left it, but it… wasn't.

"Oh! Hijiri!" Shima exclaimed, noticing that store owner's eyes had focused again.

"Kairi," Kairi corrected, eyebrows rising because the repeat fantasy hadn't melted away yet.

"Kairi," agreed the young man, dodging a snap from the irate dinosaur's beak. As he ran (amazing multi-tasker, Kairi's brain informed him, and rationalized Shima's secret desires to sprout eighty-two extra limbs), he dug around in his pants, and whipped out, miraculously, a bowl of curry rice. Never mind where he'd pulled that from—extremely delicious-looking curry rice. Kairi's stomach growled. He'd either eaten ten minutes ago, or nine days. One could never be sure. It was rather like the electric bill. Who'd paid that, anyway? That rice looked quite good.

"Made this for you!" Shima chirped, whipping his arm back.

As Shima hurled dinner into Kairi's face, Kairi discovered that it tasted quite good as well, and that the floor of Delirium had not been carpeted while he was away because ouch that hurt. It looked cleaner though, so he scooped rice off of it and stuck it in his mouth before he sat up, watching the progression before him (it was very tasty rice). Shima beamed as though he hadn't just thrown a rice bowl from heaven knew where in those exceedingly well-tailored pants at a recent acquaintance's head.

"You should take better care of yourself, Ka-i-ri!" He proclaimed.

He'd picked up the name exceptionally well. It fit in his mouth like he said it every day, and for a moment Kairi felt that surely he must have known Shima for as long as he could remember.  
This wasn't a dream, was it?

Shima proceeded to scream some more and run a little faster, until he actually seemed to be gaining on the pterodactyl, which was upsetting both involved parties. Kairi just stared.

It was all very, very noisy.

And Kairi realized, just before he took the hand of the mermaid princess who would be his bride, that he was actually quite a bit happy, and the next time the world took a breath, he'd be smiling again.

He could hardly wait.


End file.
